Book excerpt: CIMA offers a business qualification with a finance focus, aiming to produce members with accounting prowess who are skilled in strategic decision-making. 98% of its members work in business, the highest proportion of any worldwide accountancy body. Paper E3 'Enterprise Strategy' is a wide-ranging exam that includes aspects of strategic analysis, choice and implementation. To pass, candidates need both technical knowledge and the ability to apply their knowledge to specific scenarios.The syllabus is split into four areas: * Interacting with the Competitive Environment (20%) * Change Management (20%) * Evaluation of Strategic Options (30%) * Implementation of Strategic Plans (30%)The first section explores the impact and influence of an organisation's environment on its strategy. An organisation needs to take account of its environmental context as well as its own internal capabilities when assessing the strategic options available to it. Having identified these options, it then has to evaluate them to decide which is the most appropriate to pursue.The E3 syllabus recognises that implementing strategic plans involves managing change, and 20% of the syllabus is now devoted to issues involved in managing the change process. Change Management has not previously been examined at Strategic Level in the CIMA exams. The final section of the syllabus looks at the ways organisations control and measure the performance of the strategies they have implemented. The E3 Study Text provides you with comprehensive coverage of the principles of business strategy and how they can be applied to design and implement enterprise strategies. The Text also offers a range of short case studies which illustrate how business strategy ideas are applied in the real world. In the E3 exam, your ability to apply knowledge to a scenario is as important as pure knowledge, but it is still crucial to have a sound understanding of the key terms and ideas. The 'key terms' feature in the text will help you identify these key terms, while the 'section summaries' provide a convenient overview of each section of the text."e;